Ramesh Thakur on the Iran War: Diplomacy, Deterrence and the Nuclear Shadow

Ramesh Thakur is an Australian academic, author, and international affairs expert, currently Emeritus Professor in the Crawford School of Public Policy at The Australian National University (ANU). Born on 23 November 1948 in Sitamarhi, Bihar, India, he was educated in India (BA Honours, University of Calcutta) and Canada (MA and PhD in Political Studies, Queen’s University). He holds Australian, Canadian, and New Zealand nationality.

archive.unu.edu

Thakur has held full-time academic posts in Fiji (University of the South Pacific), New Zealand (University of Otago, where he became Professor of International Relations), Canada (University of Waterloo; Foundation Director of the Balsillie School of International Affairs), and Australia (including Head of the Peace Research Centre and Director of the Centre for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament at ANU). He previously served as Senior Vice Rector of the United Nations University and Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations (1998–2007). He has advised the Australian, New Zealand, and Norwegian governments on arms control, disarmament, and international security.

crawford.anu.edu.au

A Commissioner and one of the principal authors of the landmark The Responsibility to Protect report (2001), he was also Senior Adviser on Reforms and principal writer of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s second reform report (2002). He served as Editor-in-Chief of Global Governance (2013–18) and is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of International Affairs, Senior Research Fellow at the Toda Peace Institute, and Brownstone Institute senior scholar. He co-convened the Asia-Pacific Leadership Network for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.

lowyinstitute.org

The author or editor of dozens of books and hundreds of articles and chapters, his works focus on the United Nations, peace and security, nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, global governance, diplomacy, and the Responsibility to Protect. Notable titles include The United Nations, Peace and Security: From Collective Security to the Responsibility to Protect (Cambridge University Press), Global Governance and the UN: An Unfinished Journey (with Thomas G. Weiss), The Oxford Handbook of Modern Diplomacy, and The Nuclear Ban Treaty: A Transformational Reframing of the Global Nuclear Order. He is a regular media commentator.